Abstract
Abstract
A method for determining the fracture toughness of a pneumatic tyre sidewall was developed. Conventional methods of fracture toughness determination require the structural material to be tested independently of the structure. the proposed method allows fracture toughness to be measured directly from the type sidewall. Two advantages follow: (i) elimination of the need for duplicating the identical cured sidewall properties in the testpiece, and (ii) avoidance of the buckling inherent in thin sidewall test specimens.
The pneumatic tyre chosen for the investigation was a 7.75–14 bias passenger tyre with a two-ply nylon carcass. An artificial crack was created in the tyre sidewall and the cracked tyre was loaded by inflation pressure. The experimental parameters taken from the tyre include the inflation pressure, volume, and crack opening area at different crack lengths. Based on a quasistatic energy analysis, the pressure-volume-crack length diagram was used to graphically determine the sidewall fracture toughness. In addition, an equation based on the reciprocal theorem for a cracked body and netting analysis was derived and used to analytically determine the sidewall fracture toughness. The computed fracture toughness compares reasonably well with the measured G values via the experimental approach.
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